Ephemera

I love Twitter but normally hate seeing auto-generated tweets. But I love making auto-generated tweets! 

To avoid hypocrisy on my personal @sillygwailo account, I created the @justagwailo account to post tweets generated from pressing a button somewhere else. (I don't believe in recurring tweets written by robots. For example, I don't post any "daily summary" tweets.) Tweets that go to the @justagwailo account are generally written by a robot. Usually following a template but with dynamic content. There are some scheduled or repeating tweets going to the automated ephemera account (I used Cheap Bots, Done Quick! to perodically highlight some of my social media on Twitter, and now I use Cheap Bots, Toot Sweet! for doing the same on Mastodon) but almost always, I have to somehow, and for each one, request that the tweet be made. 

Starting in April 2023, I post automated ephemera to my @justagwailo@mstdn.ca Mastodon account.

Examples:

• • In Untappd, after a chug a beer, and "check in" to that drink, I'll select the 'tweet' checkbox

  • If I like something on Instapaper, I have that (eventually, making two stops en route) go to the automated ephemera (through RSS then IFTTT, or my self-hosted Huginn) account.

An alphabetical list of services that post to the @justagwailo account:

• • Instagram photos

  • Untappd checkins (beers)

  • Disqus (liking a post or comment)

  • Goodreads book reading progress

  • Instapaper likes

  • The occasional Pinboard bookmark

  • ifttt.com (If This Then That, and only because the services themselves don't do it 'natively'):

    • MetaFilter likes (via RSS)

    • Vimeo likes

    • Flickr favorites (still true? Yes, still true)

  • MLB At the Ballpark when attending a game

  • Reading.am "Yep" (which is pretty much anything I send that way)

  • SoundCloud hearts

  • Trakt.tv checkins

  • YouTube Favorites

The rare auto-tweets that go to @sillygwailo:

• • Foursquare checkins - mainly because the Foursquare profile URL is tied to your Twitter handle. Very rare. I can't remember the last time I did it.

  • Plancast plans